Alone
by Brianna Jacobs
Summary: After the war, Harry reflects on the damages done.


Title: Alone

Author: Bri

Warnings: None really, unless you haven't read book seven, but this story doesn't really follow that by much. This is un-beta'd, so be kind. Just let me know about any problems, and I'll do my best to fix 'em.

Word count: 1109

Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue.

We don't have many scars. That's the glory of magic, and its curse. There are no lasting reminders of the pain and suffering we all saw during that year. But that only means that you can't tell what we've all been through.

I try to forget, to ignore the faces of the dead as they parade in front of me every day; but it's hard. I can't close my eyes to sleep without seeing their faces. Cedric, Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Snape and so many others. They all gave up their lives to get me there, to let me do what I was destined to do, but now it seems as though it will never end.

To the world we show smiling, confident faces. We act as though it doesn't bother us. We don't tell them about the times we wake up screaming in the middle of the night, and we don't talk about the three or four nights a week when we sit up all night drinking tea and cocoa, and trying to tune out the screams of the dead and dying that echo in our ears.

We got lucky, as we sit together in the wee hours of the morning. We sit and look at each other over steaming mugs, and we know that we are all thinking the same thing. "It could have been us, we could be the ones being mourned right now. We could have left them alone." It's always a disturbing though, and you can tell when it runs though our minds.

We watch as one by one each other's faces darken, and you know that it's only a matter a time before you think that too. We try to brace ourselves for the thoughts that we know are coming, knowing that it doesn't do any good, just as we try, and fail, night by night to block out the screams and blood.

In those rare times when we can get to sleep, we are haunted by nightmares. After the first few nights of waking up alone screaming, we started sleeping together. There was no meaning behind it; we just piled together like a bunch of puppies, so that when we wake up screaming, we're not waking up alone.

It's always the 10 of us. Hermione, Ron, George, Neville, Ginny, Lavender, Luna, Dean, Katie, and me. When the dust settled over the last battle, I looked around and realized that we were the only ones left standing together.

We go back to school in the morning, and I'm not sure how we'll be able separate. I don't know if we'll be able to sleep alone, and I don't know how we'll get through classes. We haven't spoken very much beyond the screaming, and the words we whisper in the dark of night to sooth each other back into rest.

The first day back we didn't even make it into the great hall, we walked through the doors, and Lavender, Katie, and Ginny burst into tears, collapsing on the floor. We picked them up, and all of us went to the infirmary. We heard later that most of the teachers panicked because they thought we hadn't come, until the school nurse came in and found us watching over the three girls.

When McGonagall came to find us, we didn't say anything, and stayed there all night. The next day we headed back to our dormitories, and barely made it through the door before our fellow housemates mobbed us. It took us all of thirty seconds before we retreated to the library, and we weren't surprised to find Luna there already.

The librarian took one look at us, and promptly shooed the gawkers away from our table. She managed to keep them away for the rest of the day, though we couldn't quite figure out how. When night fell we were chivied off to our houses, and then sent to our rooms.

When I woke up screaming and heard Ron, Neville, and Dean tossing and turning in their beds, I knew that this wasn't going to work. It was the work of minutes to sent messages to George, Luna, Katie, Hermione, Ginny, and Lavender. We tore the beds apart, and when the sun rose it found us curled up together on the floor, arms and legs intertwined, all of us showing a distinct lack of sleep.

A week into the school year McGonagall found us sleeping in our typical pile. She took one look at our faces, and the next thing we knew we had been moved to a set of apartments in the teacher's wing.

For the most part we were left alone, allowed to recover from the horrors of the war as best we could. It was a hard year, we couldn't stand to look at the Hogwarts we had known, the battle had changed it almost beyond recognition. There were times, months on end, when we didn't leave the rooms during the day. In fact we only left to wander in a group at night. It was good to get back to the magic, and we managed to repair much of the damage done to the castle during out nighttime wanders.

As the months past, and the damage to Hogwarts was mended, it was as though we were mending ourselves at the same time. The nightmares decreased, and it became easier to talk amongst ourselves.

By the time the castle was back to its former glory, people had begun to pair off, and we were slowly integrating back into the normal life of the school.

Neville went to teach Herbology, and Hermione began filling in for any teacher who was sick, or simply wanted a break. Katie and George eventually left to go re-open the store, while Dean, Lavender and Luna went on a vacation, wandering around England to go say good bye to all the friends who had fallen.

As for me and Ginny, we stayed at Hogwarts. We walked the halls by night, fixing and restoring anything that wasn't right, and strengthening the protective spells on the castle.

We would go and sit on the Astronomy tower some nights, when it wasn't too cold. We would look out over the grounds, and remember all those who fell to Voldemort, and we would watch the students from the windows in our rooms, and remember why we had fought.

The war may have battered us, and it may have broken us, but we could pull through. We might still be separate from the rest of the world, the ten of us who were together until the end, but we would never be alone.


End file.
